BOSCH TV - latest news

BOSCH SEASON FOUR CONFIRMED!

From Michael Connelly:

The big news is that there will be a fourth season of Bosch! Amazon Studios has said let's do it again and we are happy to oblige. It wasn't exactly arbitrary but when we first started making the show I off-handedly said I would like 60 hours of television to properly tell the Harry Bosch story. Well, this gets us almost there. It is also very exciting to get this news before we finish filming season 3. It allows us to set up season 4 with some story lines that are not tied up. Amazon doesn't make this sort of decision in a vacuum. Viewership is the key ingredient. I want to thank everyone who has watched the first two seasons and ridden along with us. Thanks to you we get to do it again! I am confident season 3 - we are almost finished - is going to raise the bar another notch and then it's on to season 4.

BOSCH SEASON THREE OFFICIAL TRAILER

FILMING SEASON THREE

Sharkey lives!

The runaway teenaged tagger from The Black Echo comes to life in season 3. It only took 25 years!

From Michael Connelly:

It is hard to put into words what I feel as I see these scenes with Harry Bosch and the kid Sharkey being filmed. Right out of my first novel The Black Echo. When I wrote it 25 plus years ago I started with Sharkey. The street kid was the first fictional character on the page, drawn from runaway kids I knew while growing up and working in the kitchens of hotels in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Harry came into the story after - obviously drawn from literary and movie heroes as well as detectives I met as a news reporter. So to see this story come alive now with these two fine actors - Titus Welliver of course as Harry, Bridger Zadina as Sharkey - is amazing to me. After three seasons you'd think this would get old but I am mesmerized by these two and their interactions. More so than past days on the set, I get a nostalgic feel to it. I remember writing that first book and trying to find time to get to it between the hours of my real job as a reporter. I am certainly happy that we decided not to present the show in the same order of the books. Waiting to do The Black Echo in season 3 gave this crew on both sides of the camera better understanding of what we have and what we want to accomplish. I think this season will be the one I've waited 25 years for.

BOSCH RENEWED FOR A THIRD SEASON!

From Michael Connelly:

I just got the word that season 3 of Bosch is a go. We are going to adapt The Black Echo and elements of A Darkness More than Night this time around. Thank you to everybody who watched Season 2. Amazon makes their decisions based on viewer support. It's been there from the start and I greatly appreciate every viewer of the show. Now we'll get to work on making season 3 better than season 2 and a deeper look at Harry Bosch and his colleagues.

BOSCH SECOND SEASON OFFICIAL TRAILER

MICHAEL CONNELLY ON BOSCH SEASON TWO

At the end of Bosch season one, Detective Harry Bosch gets suspended from the LAPD and he leaves Los Angeles to go visit his daughter in Las Vegas. Where and when does season two pickup?

Michael Connelly: It picks up six months later on the day that Harry goes back to work from his suspension for throwing Capt. Pounds through a window. He shaves off his beard and heads in. Soon enough he and Edgar catch a case. A man – later determined to be in the pornography business – is found shot to death and stuffed in the trunk of his Bentley. In the 1997 book Trunk Music it was a Rolls Royce but we were told all the rich pornographers drive Bentleys now.

Season two of Bosch has plot elements taken mainly from Trunk Music with additional parts from The Drop and The Last Coyote. How did you decide which book plot points to use?

Michael Connelly: I find it interesting how it all comes about. As a priority for season two we wanted to show more of Harry's relationship with his daughter. Well, she lives in Las Vegas with her mother. So Trunk Music, which is partly set in Vegas, became an obvious choice. It became the backbone of the season and we then supplemented it with elements of the two other books. I particularly like how we updated The Last Coyote and hinted at it for several episodes before focusing on it in the finale. It really an important part of the Bosch story.

How closely does season 2 follow the books?

Michael Connelly: That's hard to answer. Two of these books are 20 years old and in them Bosch didn't have a daughter, let alone things like cell phones, Internet and other modern law enforcement tools like DNA, etc. So just contemporizing the story requires change. But I think we are true to the character of Harry and many important plot points. In other words, same good guys, same bad guys.

Can you tell us about some of the new characters we will meet in season two and the actors who play them?

Michael Connelly: We really got a great crew of new guest stars big and small. Jeri Ryan plays the femme fatale Veronica Allen, who is the widow of the man in the trunk. Brent Sexton, who did a great turn on The Killing, plays Carl Nash, a retired cop turned security guard, who plays a key part in the investigation. They are entwined in the plot through the whole season but we had some great one and done performances - one scene appearances. Probably too many to go through here but I was constantly wowed when i was on the set and I would see actors killing it in front of the camera. You add all of that to the outstanding work turned in by our regulars - Titus, Jamie, Amy, Lance, Sarah and Madison - and you have a season that I am really excited about.

From your perspective, how was working on Bosch season two? Was it easier or better than season one?

Michael Connelly: I always say that the more you do something the better you get at it. I think we had more confidence and know-how this year and it paid off in what we got on film. I loved and am proud of season one but I feel better about season two.

Will there be a season 3?

Michael Connelly: That's the plan but we won't know anything official until after it drops March 11 [NB: US release date - Aus release date TBC] and we see how many people watch and what they are saying about it. Confidence is high, though. We are already thinking about season 3 and what books to tackle.

BOSCH GETS A SECOND SEASON

Bosch, Amazon Prime's series starring Titus Welliver as the no-nonsense investigator featured in a series of acclaimed novels by Michael Connelly (shown in Australia on SBS One), received a green light for a second season, barely a month after its premiere. Pre-production on season 2 began the last week of April and shooting in late July.

The second season will draw primarily from Connelly's novel Trunk Music. The season will also include elements of The Last Coyote and The Drop.

WATCH THE TRAILER FOR BOSCH SEASON ONE

MICHAEL CONNELLY TALKS ABOUT BOSCH

BOSCH IS COMING TO AUSTRALIA ON SBS ONE!

SBS has purchased the first two seasons of Amazon's series starring Titus Welliver as the conflicted LAPD detective Harry Bosch and will air the first ten episodes from29 July 2015.

Marshall Heald, director of television and online content for SBS, said: "The story of LAPD homicide detective Harry Bosch has captivated millions of readers for years and Bosch the series brings the same grit and intrigue fans of author Michael Connelly's best-selling franchise expect and new audiences will be gripped by."

Amazon renewed the series one month after the biggest ever debut weekend for the streaming service. During its first four weeks, it was the most-watched show on Amazon, including all movies and television.

MICHAEL CONNELLY ON BOSCH

Can you tell us what is different from the books in this TV show?
In making the shift from page to screen (whatever screen that may be) we brought in a fair amount of changes to the world of Harry Bosch. First of all we wanted the story to be contemporary – L.A. right now – and yet we had stories going back twenty years about a character who ages in real time. We also had a character who had different romantic relationships, detective partners and supervisors along those twenty years, as well as a daughter who appears at some point. We also had a military history that would only work in L.A. right now if Harry was over 60 years old. So we picked and chose from all of those aspects from the books while creating a few new things as well. We built the first story/season from two of the books – City of Bones and The Concrete Blonde – as well as a short story called Cielo Azul.

The basic status of Harry in what we are filming is that he is 47 years old and a veteran of the first Gulf War in 1991, where he was part of a Special Forces team that cleared tunnels. He has now been a police officer for twenty years with a one year exception when he re-upped with the Army after 9/11, as many LAPD officers did. He came back to the force after serving in Afghanistan and again encountering tunnel warfare.

In Bosch, Harry is working at Hollywood Division on the homicide squad. His supervisor is Lt. Billets though Lt. Pounds is present in the story. His partner is Jerry Edgar and Deputy Chief Irvin Irving is an ominous presence in the story as well.

How are you involved?
My involvement in the pilot has been full time and I have approved everything we are doing every step of the way, including the casting of Titus Welliver as Harry Bosch. I think he is going to be perfect as he brings this character to life on screen. The pilot is being produced by Fabrik Entertainment, makers of previous shows such as The Killing and Burn Notice. The show runner is Eric Overmyer, who has worked on shows ranging from Homicide: Life on the Streets to The Wire and Treme.

I am very excited about the prospects of this show. Harry Bosch is not right for network TV and Amazon Studios reached out to me because they understood Harry Bosch and wanted to help me realize the character in this different dimension. We have a tight script, a great cast and production team, and I am very confident we are making something all Harry Bosch fans (including myself!) will embrace.

How does this work with Amazon?
We are producing the show for Amazon Studios which means that when it is released it will be streamed off Amazon's instant video service. This means you can watch it on your computer or digital device as well as on your television if you have it set up with an Amazon connection. Sometime early next year – probably in March – this pilot will be available for free viewing and comment. However, like HBO or Netflix or any cable provider, Amazon streaming is a subscription service provided under Amazon Prime. If Bosch goes to series a membership in Amazon Prime will be needed to watch it at some point.